January 29, 2004

Diebold Systems responds to a report submitted to the state of Maryland which revealed that their electronic voting machines had software security flaws that could potentially compromise election outcomes. The report, titled Response to: Department of Legislative Services Trusted Agent Report on Diebold AccuVote-TS Voting System, recommended a number of corrective actions to fix security holes after an outside consulting firm successfully hacked into the voting systems under conditions similar to an election environment. Diebold allayed concerns over the flaws in their software and a spokesman stated that, "There is nothing that has not been or can't be mitigated" in “assuring the utmost security” for the upcoming March and future elections. In an ever more networked and computerized voting infrastructure, security, accuracy and transparency could play a key role in democratic elections.